I have four closets in the house that have bi-fold doors. With the updating of the door hardware to nickel, I have a small issue with the hinges on these bi-fold doors. They’re brass and I wasn’t able to find any drop-in nickel replacements for them. Well actually, the hinges are painted over, which might be even worse than being brass.
It’s not a huge deal because you only see the hinges when the doors are open (that’s how bi-fold doors work). But still, I want things to look good when they’re visible. So, I think that having the hinges unfinished instead of painted will be an improvement, and I want them to at least look like they are nickel. So, I’ll just spray paint them and hope that looks sufficient.
But first, I have to get the old paint off. I heard from the Internet that this is a simple task involving heat and water. I’m pretty sure it is, because I used the same technique when getting the paint off my closet shelving brackets. But this is probably going to take a while to get off. To accomplish this, I purchased a cheap $20 crock pot and the hinges will soak in water on high heat throughout the day. The paint should be “fall off the bone” ready when I get back from work.
While prepping for that, after removing all the hardware from one door, I got to try out my new sawhorses. With the doors propped up, I sanded down the edges of each part of the door and scuffed up the surface for the new paint.
If this soaking and spray painting trick doesn’t work out, a subsequent search with more appropriate keywords brought up some places to find my hinges. Not knowing what the hinge is called was holding me back. Apparently, the hinge is a “3-leaf non-mortise hinge” and is commonly used for shutters. …And my doors, for whatever reason. I would need 18 of the things, which would cost about $40. That’s a bit more than the cost of the spray paint and crock pot that I bought, so maybe it won’t come to that.
And while I’m at it, the two single bi-fold doors on the linen closets need some adjustment. The top anchor seems to have drifted a little, so the door presses up against the wall when closed. In both cases, it’s actively damaging the wall, so I need to repair the wall and adjust the anchor. Not sure why I lived with it like that as long as I did.
The soaking did the trick. The paint just slid right off. However… the painting of the first set of hinges resulted in some pretty shitty results. Terrible-looking. I know I said I wanted everything in my remodel to be quality, so I don’t even know why I cheaped out on this. So, I guess I’m ordering new hinges for those doors, too. And no more slow cooking brass.